SOCCER: Macclesfield Town's boardroom saga is nearing an end after a group of major shareholders decided not to try to force out directors Alan Cash and Rob Bickerton.

The shareholders decided against calling an Extraordinary General Meeting to call for Cash and Bickerton to quit after heeding an appeal from former director Jeremy Turner.

Turner asked shareholders to give the current board a chance to take the club forward until the next Annual General Meeting, which is expected to be called towards the end of this year.

His appeal is thought to have stalled former chairman Eddie Furlong's chances of an immediate return to the board.

Furlong is understood to have rejected a compromise deal, which would have seen him return to the board with Turner and former Bodycote boss John Chesworth.

The trio, who have all been directors before, will not be rejoining the board for the time being.

That will leave a board of six directors when Furlong's resignation notice period expires later this month.

Turner has backed Furlong during the three-month boardroom dispute.

The dispute began when Furlong was voted out of the chair by Cash, Bickerton and Mike Rance in February. Furlong offered his resignation as a director on April 25 after Cash, Bickerton and chairman Colin Garlick withdrew resignations they had submitted three weeks earlier.

But Turner told a meeting of shareholders last Friday that he would be prepared to return to a board which included Cash and Bickerton - something he had said previously he would not do.

He added that he would want ex-chairman Eddie Furlong and former Bodycote boss John Chesworth to come onto the board with him.

Turner, who quit the board last November in protest at the way fellow directors Martin Lenton and Roy Higginbotham had been forced to leave following a row over club finances, explained that Furlong felt uneasy about a compromise deal at present.

He said: "The shareholders wanted Eddie Furlong back on the board. That was not going to be easy to achieve.

"But I said that I would be prepared to bite the bullet and go back if Eddie and John Chesworth came with me.

"I put this to Eddie on Friday, and he told me to put it to the shareholders, and see what they had to say. They wanted it to happen. We thought it would be a good compromise.

"But when I spoke to Eddie on Saturday, he said he was not going to do it."

Turner added that it was time for everybody to pull together to take the club forward.

He said: "I think that time is going to be a great healer. We have to put out a strong message that it is time to let Colin Garlick get on with running the board and the football club.

"If we keep carrying on like this, then before we know it, it's going to be the start of next season.

"I would call for the shareholders to give their support to Colin until the next AGM. Give the current board of directors the chance to prove their worth."

Chairman Colin Garlick said: "It would appear that there is not going to be an EGM now, and that is welcome news.

"We are committed to holding an informal shareholders' meeting, which we hope to hold before the end of June, so that we can keep them informed of events at the club."